Miscellaneous

Political Poison

By Anne Skove, Esq.

Are politics infecting the judiciary?

Justice O'Connor (ret.) thinks so, and she's taken her battle to the pages of Parade Magazine.

Political pressures can and do interfere with judicial independence. Justice O'Connor tells horror stories about judicial elections in particular, and calls for merit selection with retention elections to fix the problem.

But upon what merits? Are appointments any cleaner? They may be less expensive -- J. O'Connor cites ginormous campaign expenditures as but one factor sullying the judicial waters -- but ask someone who didn't survive a non-election process.

Newport News, Virginia, Circuit Court Judge Verbena Askew was one such judicial career fatality. She was not reappointed after members of Virginia's House of Delegates decided she was not forthcoming enough about the city's settlement (which did not admit the truth of the allegations) of a same-sex harassment suit against her. The Commonwealth's "crimes against nature" laws were invoked, and Judge Askew was no more. Racism? Homophobia? Or just playing by the rules?

To be fair, Virginia's judicial selection system is unique in the world, but you can see how this might play out in other contexts. The effect is a cheaper (in that less money is spent on ads by the candidates) but still quite politically messy system. Instead of judge-on-judge accusations, the dirty-work burden shifts to the legislature.

Still, J. O'Connor provides good advice to citizens who wish to become better informed about judicial candidates.

She also announces her affiliation with programs at Georgetown and Arizona State (Jesuits and Devils, what a combination!). ASU hosts Our Courts, a civics education project for middle- and high-schoolers. ASU's law school (we wonder what Justice O'Connor calls the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at ASU -- "Mine?") and College of Teacher Education and Leadership are joining forces on the project.

The Georgetown project is appropriately titled The Sandra Day O'Connor Project on the State of the Judiciary. It grew from a 2006 judicial independence conference co-chaired by Justice Breyer. Plans include:

• Circulating recommendations to state chief justices


• Publishing conference proceedings and scholarly background materials


• Regional conferences in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, and elsewhere


• Interactive online educational program for secondary school students


• Monitoring Congressional activity (or lack thereof) relating to federal judicial salaries


• Judicial selection conference at Georgetown Law

  See How to Save Our Courts, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Parade (February 24, 2008). Thanks to Jimmy Mac for the tip!

  Full post as published by court-o-rama.org on February 26, 2008 (boomark / email).

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